Recommended: Shermer on religion and morality

Mike Shermer's treatment of the relation of morality and theism in the recent "The Science of Good and Evil" covers the basics pretty well.

He's better on the science than the philosophy I think, but to me he's particularly good among "skeptics" at coming up with balanced arguments regarding controversial topics.

Just so you know know the slant, Mike calls himself a "nontheist," and argues from the secular-scientific perspective, but most interestingly, drawing heavily in spots from both sociological and biological data. Contrary to anti-religionists like Dawkins, he seems to lean toward a functionalist explanation (that religion serves legitimate adaptive functions in human groups as well as providing salient explanations), and even makes an argument for cultural group selection, drawing from Mayr, E.O. Wilson, and others as well as the usual suspects.

It's admittedly a stew of ideas in places, but I think that accurately reflects the state of our growing understanding of the complexities of human biology.

Highly recommended.

Todd

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